I love these Red Uniforms and First Place

This Rangers team sure is fun to watch. Despite having a predicted win total by most pundits in the low 70s, this team has come roaring out of the gates. As a long suffering Rangers fan, I am cautiously optimistic and going to enjoy every minute I can get of this season. Since the last playoff appearance in 1999, this team has spent very little time in contention. This year is different and that feels nice.

Kinsler, Young, Davis, Andrus, Frankie, Millwood. This Whole pitching staff. Salty. The list goes on and on of contributors. The Tigers are up next which has been a team that has beaten our drum the last few seasons. Payback's a bitch...

Greg Paulus of Duke basketball Fame is going to try his luck at football transferring to Syracuse. Something tells me this won't end well. If for no other reason than Syracuse football has actually sunk this low. Oh and the new Syracuse head football coach hasn't seen Paulus throw yet.

I heard the internet rumor last week that Texas was going to try their luck in the ACC... While cool in concept, let's stay in the Big XII. Come on, this isn't Russia.

The Mavs are out of the playoffs and I could really care less. Besides the childish acts of Mark Cuban and the moronic officiating (Yes, I'm a middle school referee so therefore I can judge NBA officials), I really think the NBA is just not that interesting. I appreciate the Lebrons and Kobes of the world for their athleticism, but the overall product leaves a lot to be desired. It should be an interesting Finals at least. Really, these officials are very old.

With that being said, I thought the NCAA tournament was a huge dud this year. Texas should be loaded next year with Avery Bradley and company showing up on campus. Barnes may not have to do much Xs and Os with this bunch.

Justin Leonard and Zach Johnson dueled down in San Antonio last weekend and nobody cared. Oh Johnson won for the Lake Highlands grads that were still following Leonard. Seriously, for as clutch as Leonard has been on two winning Ryder Cup teams he has come bitterly close in two british open and a couple PGA since winning his only major.

Byron Nelson has little hope this week with 13 out of top 50 players showing up to play TPC at Las Colinas. For those that don't follow golf beyond Tiger Woods, that's not good.

It's going to be a long summer, so let's get it on.

John Tyler and Plano East 1994

Hard to Believe this happened almost 15 years ago...

Classic Lou Holtz Speech

It has been WAY too long since I updated this blog. Hopefully I can start posting regular baseball updates or at least when I have the time.

In the meantime, Lou Holtz at his finest...

Erin Andrews Photos???, Check... and Interview

You know updating a blog on a regular basis is harder than it looks. And since the majority of traffic that comes to this site mostly comes from Erin Andrews searches, I feel obligated to give the public what they demand.

Thanks to Mr. SEC.com, we now have a site that has a complete Erin Andrews photo collection. Good work by those guys. I'm not sure the site is fully working yet, but this might be worth the wait.

Some guy from The Fayetteville (That's North Carolina and not Arkansas) Observer gets an interview to Erin Andrews...
Um am i next??

Great bowl review by Rivals

Ray Maualuga meet Erin Andrews

Obviously, Rey Maualuga just entered the pantheon of greatness at the Rose Bowl against Penn State. It takes a certain swagger to approach Erin Andrews in any situation, even after your team has just obliterated the Big Ten champion in the Rose Bowl.

The man does not have any easy first (it R-E-Y) or last name to spell, but he will soon become a regular in the NFL



Kudos Rey.

Rey decapitates a UCLA Quarterback...



Rey's Greatest Hits

Catch of the Year

Check out North Carolina's Hakeem Nicks against West Virginia this past Saturday..



Romo Had a Bad Day



Bob Sturm Talks about the Cowboys Collapse Bob Sturm Talks about the Cowboys Collapse in Philadelphia

Yes, Erin Andrews will be at the Holiday Bowl on January 30th between Oregon and Oklahoma St.

Kevin Dunn on CBS College Sports

Erin Andrews in Austin

Wish Granted...

BCS Chaos - Business As Usual

Texas Tech gets thrashed by OU 65-21 but it could have been much worse




In the not so shocking anymore department, Notre Dame loses to Syracuse


USC is on deck for the Irish.... yikes!!!

11/22 College Football Picks

It has been a tale of two season for me picking college football games. I could not lose at the start of the year but had a couple bad weeks in late October / early November timeframe.

Plowing on and here is a look at this weekend's games:

@vandy -3 over Tennessee -- I had a little doubt about this Vandy squad prior to the Kentucky game, but a strong performance in lexington leads me to believe that they are ready to put the Vols out for a knockout punch.

michigan St. +15 over Penn St. --
I crashed and burned badly taking Michigan st. and the points against Ohio St. I think this team matches up against a physical penn st. squad and can stay within 2 TD in a most likely bad weather situation at Happy Valley.

@Northwestern +2.5 over Illinois
This should be a hard fought game, but I think NW makes enough plays defensively to pull it out.

Colorado St. -2.5 over Wyoming
Wyoming's O is really terrible and i don't think their D can stop a pretty decent balanced Colo St. offense. Colo St. becomes bowl eligible with a win.

@memphis - over UCF
Bye week for a memphis who will put up too many points on a good UCF defensive squad who can't score any points.

@Rutgers -17 over Army
Army has been feisty this year but runs into a buzzsaw that is Rutgers right now. Watch out for Schiano's bunch the rest of the way.

Texas Tech +7 over OU / Over 74
I think the Sooners eventually pull this one out, but Tech covers the total in a scoring affair.

@Rice -9 over marshall
Rice off a bye puts up too many points for the Herd to hang around.

Lute Olsen Era Starts Poorly at Arizona; Texas Tech HOOPS goes Bezerk

From Yahoo Sports

Arizona's head-shakingly bad loss to UAB


The video (thanks to College Hoops Journal and Awful Announcing). The relevant fouls take place at about the :25 second and 3:50 marks, respectively:






Tech basketball team scores 167 over a Division II opponent

One Word for Football Weekend - WILD

Black Kicker Wins Game For Maryland



Pete Carroll and Jim Harbaugh Rivalry Continues to Build as USC beats Stanford 45-23


Wild Ending to the First 11-10 game in NFL History

Erin Andrews and Bill Murray

Erin Andrews is slowly taking over Corporate America..





Bill Murray visits Austin and hilarity ensues.

9/27 Picks

I've slacked this year so far on posting my college football picks. While I am off to a torrid start, I have yet to post my plays on this blog. Let's hope the good run continues.

First, check out super redshirt Freshman QB Robert Griffin of Baylor who is making some waves down in Waco this year.



Here is what I like this weekend:

Colorado +6 over Florida St. (in Jax) --

Florida St. had 7 Turnovers against Wake last weekend so I guess their offensive woes are not over. Colorado is gritty as hell this year and I expect their defense to keep them in this one. While FSU will have the fan advantage, only 40K tickets were sold as of midweek.

@Penn St. -16 over Illinois --

This spread has moved most likely because of the return of both Penn St. defensive Lineman who were reinstated earlier this week Penn St. has been a covering machine so far this year so we will see if it continues in their big 10 opener.

@UNLV -4 over Nevada --

UNLV all of a sudden looks pretty salty after wins against Arizona St. and Iowa St. This is a bitter rivalry and Nevada has won the last few in this series. I think it changes this week. Hat tip to dolly for his inside info on the Rebels.

Northwestern +8.5 over Iowa --

Iowa traditionally is very tough at home under Ferentz. But Northwestern quietly has been building their program and I expect this one to be close.

Wisky -6 over Michigan --

Both teams off a bye week and I think Wisconsin needs to have a good showing prior to bigger tilts against Ohio St. and Penn ST. I don't think Michigan has enough to stay in this one even at home.

Bama +7 over Georgia --

This series is historically very tight and I see no reason for this game to be any different. Take the points even on the road with Bama...

Good luck to everyone this week...

College Football = Erin Andrews

Week 2 of the college football season and outside of a few intriguing matchups (East Carolina / West Virginia and Ole Miss/Wake Forest), the slate is full of blowout potential or outright snoozefests. With the monumental September 13th matchups on the horizon,




I stumbled across this Deadspin site that is a good location for all things Erin Andrews.

Greg Davis Gets Creative

At least according to Orangebloods.com columnist Chip Brown. It turns out Mack Brown is actually one of the main reasons Texas has looked vanilla on offense in some big games in recent memory.

From the article:

anyone has wanted to push the envelope offensively, it's Davis, who drew up game plans for converted slot back Hines Ward to play quarterback at Georgia in 1995. Ward stepped in when the team's top two quarterbacks went down with injuries. Ward ended up setting a school bowl game record by completing 31-of-59 passes for 413 yards in the Peach Bowl that year.

If anyone's been tapping the brakes, it's Brown. What you've seen on offense at Texas the last 10 years is what Brown is willing to permit. Brown's philosophy has essentially been to opposing defenses, "You know what we're going to run, but we have better talent and we will out-execute you."That was reiterated by former UT quarterback Major Applewhite, who helped pull off one of Brown's three signature wins at Texas - at Nebraska in 1998 (at Ohio State in 2005 and USC are the others).

"Greg has plenty of creativity," Applewhite said. "As a coordinator, having been one, you can get as crazy as you want to get. But when you've got great players, you've got to toe the line on that. If you've got great players, you can beat most of the teams if you execute.

"But we're going to add wrinkles as we need to feature our players, as Coach Davis has done. But at the same time, we do a good job recruiting, and we need to trust our scheme and what we do and execute and not just be a team with a bunch of gadget and trick plays. I think we can line up and beat people, but we also have those wrinkles to add some multiplicity to what we do."

Brown has final say over each play called by Davis.

"Greg and I discuss every game plan," Brown said. "I hear every play, and one of the things I can do because he's tough and not sensitive at all - if I don't like something he's doing I can tell him and he'll listen. He's got an opinion about it, and if he doesn't like it he'll tell me. But if it needs to be changed, he'll change it."

I'd have to think there have been more than 3 signature wins under Brown, but that's just me...


The Will Muschamp factor

The Pirate Leach Recruits Jamaica

At least, he has thought about it. Texas Tech football coach Mike Leach watched the Olympics and 100M and 200M sprinter Usain Bolt win gold medals in both events.

Here are Leach's comments on the Carribbean country...

I got to be honest, I've been thinking about recruiting Jamaica since I saw that stuff," Leach told hosts Andrew Siciliano and Krystal Fernandez. "I've been to Jamaica and let me tell you something ... here's the extent that I've thought about that subject, there's approximately 2.8 million people in Jamaica, which is approximately the size of the state of Iowa or Kansas, or the city of Houston.

"It's almost like the country of Jamaica is sitting there saying, 'If you would have just told us that this was important we could have won a lot of this stuff a long time ago.'

Thanks to Wizard of Odds for this find off the Dallas Morning News Blog..

The Cotton Bowl continues its upgrades and I got to be honest.

They look good.

Manny Mania

You know I'm not a big fan of Dan Shaughnessy or any of the Boston media for that matter. His article about Manny Ramirez and his agent Scott Boras is pretty interesting.

Manny is still mashing for LA, but his effort is being questioned during his last days in Boston.

It's a shame but that's life when you are dealing with any of Scott Boras clients. It will be interesting to see how Boras client Mark Teixeira and Manny Ramirez end up doing with their new teams assuming both the Dodgers and Angels make the playoffs.


I'm still rooting for Manny to do well and unfortunately cannot say the same for Teixeira.

Hell, his new manager Joe Torre even managed to get him to cut his hair recently.

Opening Week Lines - Early Looks

You know, it's almost too good to be true but the college football season is only 2 weeks away. It's funny with college football because there might not be a ton of great nonconference games anymore as the big conference schools don't like to schedule against each other very often. It doesn't really matter though because I can watch any game and can't wait to get this season started.

My early guess as to the best game of the first week is not until Monday night with Fresno and Rutgers two prominent up and coming programs in years past square off with good talent on both squads.

I have a handful early leans as to games I've already identified at first glance. Keep in mind that I usually don't play very heavy early in the season and I stay away from big spreads for the most part. I will most likely play quite a few games at a similar level. If things go well early, I may load up on 1 or 2 games that I really like opening weekend. The key thing to remember is not to overextend yourself early in the season and not put too much money at risk opening weekend.

With all that said, I like these plays early:

@Buffalo -3 over UTEP : I like what Turner Gill is doing with the Bulls and UTEP has a long road trip right off the bat. Still thinking about this one...

@Stanford +3 over Oregon St.: When the lines initially came out, this line was closer to 6 which I really loved but I still think 3 is good value. Oregon St. really loses a lot and Stanford has a lot of key personnel coming back from an improving team that didn't do a lot last year outside of the gigantic upset (biggest upset in NCAA history by number of pts. -- +41) of USC. Take the Cardinal

Utah +3.5 over Michigan: This line opened closer to a TD so I'm going to have think about this one before I pull the trigger. Still, Michigan has a lot to think heading into this one with ghosts of Appy St. still dancing in their head.

W. Michigan +14 over Nebraska: I'm still not sold on Nebraska and W. Michigan is no slouch. Still thinking about this one.

@Kent +10 over BC: Notice the MAC trend. I think the conference makes some noise opening weekend but this is more a despise BC pick than anything else.

East Carolina +10 over VT (in Charlotte): VT normally takes a while to get rolling and ECU is riding high after a huge bowl win over Boise ST. Even with the big loss of Chris Johnson, I'll take the Pirates on a neutral field to cover the number.

Fresno +5.5 over Rutgers: I think Rutgers is going to be good without Ray Rice, but Fresno is hungry this year and will use previous nonconference road game experience to make this game a war.

It's almost time gentlemen!

Rest of the lines:

Thu 8/28 127 UTEP +3 -103
04:00 PM 128 Buffalo U -3 -107

Thu 8/28 129 Vanderbilt +3 -103
04:30 PM 130 Miami Ohio -3 -107

Thu 8/28 131 NC State +11.5 +103
05:00 PM 132 South Carolina -11.5 -113

Thu 8/28 133 Wake Forest -12.5 -105
05:00 PM 134 Baylor +12.5 -105

Thu 8/28 135 Oregon State -3 -109
06:00 PM 136 Stanford +3 -101
Thu 8/28 137 Troy -6.5 -111

04:00 PM 138 Middle Tenn St +6.5 +101
NCAA Football - Fri 8/29


Fri 8/29 145 Temple -7 -105
04:00 PM 146 Army +7 -105

Fri 8/29 147 SMU +3 -101
05:00 PM 148 Rice -3 -109

NCAA Football - Sat 8/30

Sat 8/30 149 Utah +3.5 -109
09:00 AM 150 Michigan -3.5 -101

Sat 8/30 151 Syracuse +12 -105
09:00 AM 152 Northwestern -12 -105

Sat 8/30 153 Memphis +8 -105
04:00 PM 154 Mississippi -8 -105

Sat 8/30 155 Ohio +10 +101
11:00 AM 156 Wyoming -10 -111

Sat 8/30 157 Akron +26.5 -105
11:00 AM 158 Wisconsin -26.5 -105

Sat 8/30 159 Western Michigan +14 -114
11:00 AM 160 Nebraska -14 +104

Sat 8/30 161 Washington U +13.5 -102
12:30 PM 162 Oregon -13.5 -108

Sat 8/30 163 Tulsa -14.5 -101
01:00 PM 164 UAB +14.5 -109

Sat 8/30 165 TCU -6.5 -111
03:00 PM 166 New Mexico +6.5 +101

Sat 8/30 167 Mississippi St -8.5 -101
04:00 PM 168 Louisiana Tech +8.5 -109

Sat 8/30 169 Boston College -10 +107
04:00 PM 170 Kent +10 -117

Sat 8/30 171 Oklahoma State -6 -106
04:00 PM 172 Washington State +6 -104

Sat 8/30 173 No Illinois +8.5 -112
04:00 PM 174 Minnesota U -8.5 +102

Sat 8/30 175 Bowling Green +12.5 -105
04:00 PM 176 Pittsburgh U -12.5 -105

Sat 8/30 177 Hawaii +34.5 +100
04:00 PM 178 Florida -34.5 -110

Sat 8/30 179 Virginia Tech -10 +101
04:30 PM 180 East Carolina +10 -111

Sat 8/30 181 Illinois +8 +103
04:45 PM 182 Missouri -8 -113

Sat 8/30 183 Michigan State +5.5 -105
05:00 PM 184 California -5.5 -105

Sat 8/30 185 USC -19.5 -105
05:00 PM 186 Virginia +19.5 -105

Sat 8/30 187 Alabama +5 -105
05:00 PM 188 Clemson -5 -105

Sat 8/30 189 Idaho +27 -108
07:00 PM 190 Arizona U -27 -102

Sat 8/30 191 Utah State +12.5 -105
07:00 PM 192 UNLV -12.5 -105

Sat 8/30 193 Western Kentucky +21 -105
09:00 AM 194 Indiana -21 -105

Sat 8/30 195 Ul Monroe +26.5 -105
11:00 AM 196 Auburn -26.5 -105

Sat 8/30 197 UL Lafayette +10.5 -112
04:00 PM 198 So Mississippi -10.5 +102

Sat 8/30 199 Florida Atlantic +23 -105
04:00 PM 200 Texas -23 -105

Sat 8/30 201 Florida Intl +37 -115
04:00 PM 202 Kansas -37 +105

Sat 8/30 203 Arkansas State +20.5 -105
04:00 PM 204 Texas A&M -20.5 -105

Sat 8/30 205 North Texas +24 -102
04:10 PM 206 Kansas State -24 -108

NCAA Football - Sun 8/31

Sun 8/31 207 Kentucky +4.5 -103
12:30 PM 208 Louisville -4.5 -107

Sun 8/31 209 Colorado -11.5 -105
04:30 PM 210 Colorado State +11.5 -105

NCAA Football - Mon 9/1

Mon 9/1 211 Fresno State +5.5 -110
01:00 PM 212 Rutgers -5.5 +100
Mon 9/1 213 Tennessee U -7 -101
05:00 PM 214 UCLA +7 -109